Emergency Medicine

Abstract

The coronavirus pandemic stretched healthcare resources and infrastructure worldwide. The Emergency Department (ED) is a crucial component in the frontline response to the pandemic. In this chapter, we discuss the logistical and operational challenges faced, the innovative solutions employed, and the lessons learned in our ED as we strived to overcome this unprecedented challenge. Whilst we will share much of what we learned, what we did, and what we believe was responsible for our many successes, at the same time, we are left with a sadness that our healthcare systems (and ‘our’ could be applied locally to our community, nationally to our country, and globally to our planet) were simply not designed nor prepared to properly confront a pandemic. The number of patient deaths we witnessed still feels somewhat incomprehensible and scarring. We do, however, hope that our learnings may help inform decisions at other EDs, help prepare us for future crises, and, if nothing else, confers confidence in the ED’s ability to overcome this pandemic.